


Legend of the Vampire

by Haecceity



Category: Legend of the Seeker, Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: M/M, Powerful Magic, Vampires, references to past canon relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-26
Updated: 2013-12-26
Packaged: 2018-01-06 04:24:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1102366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haecceity/pseuds/Haecceity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darken attempts to find a way around returning to the Underworld</p>
            </blockquote>





	Legend of the Vampire

Elijah took a deep breath and thought he must be dreaming. Since the Industrial Revolution and the discovery of petroleum products, the air had taken on a different flavor. Its absence was the first thing he noticed, swiftly followed by the prevalence of natural sounds. Insects buzzed. A draught tugged at a curtain, scraping the fabric against stone. Somewhere in the distance a horse whinnied. It had been decades since Elijah had been away from the roar of internal combustion engines. The natural world sounded so peaceful without that disruption.

He opened his eyes and pulled himself into a sitting position. Under the guise of adjusting his cuffs, he checked his daylight ring. Looking around, he saw he was in a room of quarried stone. Detailed tapestries hung on the walls, fading from exposure to the sunlight streaming in from the arrow slits. Three women in red leather stood over a limp blonde woman splayed on the floor with her throat cut. The draught was blowing the scent of her blood away from him. Crouched under one of the arrow slits so that the light made him difficult to see, was a dark haired man.

“So you’re the solution to all my problems,” the man said thoughtfully.

In the flicker of an eyelid, Elijah was on his feet, pressing his hands against an invisible barrier. Looking down, he saw he was contained within an arcane symbol painted in blood. The corpse across the room was too freshly dead to have been the source. “Magic.” Elijah said slowly. “Let me go and I’ll let you live.”

“I have made deals with things far scarier than you.” The other man said, standing.

Elijah stared unblinkingly, holding himself inhumanly still. “You will let me out sooner or later. I am a patient man. I can wait.”

*

Hesitation would be seen as weakness but Darken took the time to circle the stranger’s cage anyway, drawing it out onto his own time. The man didn’t turn to watch him and yet left no doubt that Darken had his attention. Instead of worrying about how to coerce the answers he wanted, Darken inspected what he’d caught.

The clothes were an unusual style; dark trousers, a dark coat that looked too light to be anything other than a fashion statement, and a white shirt with a collar that combined with a dark strip of cloth tied around his neck to make an arrow pointing at his adam’s apple. Darken knew nothing about the fashions of wherever but they worked along the same basic lines, accentuating the breadth of the man’s shoulders.

Touching his fingers to his lips in thought, he frowned. “I was not expecting you.”

The other man raised his eyebrows inquisitively.

“I was hoping for an object. A scroll or a phial or an artifact.” Darken said slowly. “Something I could use.”

“Why should I help you?” the man asked, blandly curious. His dark brown eyes held a studied impassivity.

“I can walk away.” Darken offered. “I can walk out of here and make sure no one ever comes near this fortress.”

“A valiant effort,” the man said, pursing his lips thoughtfully. “But eventually the fortress will fall apart and I assume the symbol will only hold me so long as it’s whole. One day, I’ll be free.”

Darken stopped. He could hear his heart beat harder. His heart, Walter’s heart. “You will live so long.”

“Longer.”

“If I let you out now instead of centuries from now, will you share your secret with me?” Darken asked. 

“Are you trying to negotiate with me?” He used exactly the same faintly amused tone Darken had heard from his Mord’Sith when one of their pets tried to fake obedience.

“Even if you have literally all the time in the world, a couple centuries rotting in an abandoned fortress cannot be the way you want to spend it.” Darken smiled thinly. “By the time the fortress falls in, I’ll be past any retribution. If I walk away, I lose some resources I invested in this ritual but that’s already done.” Darken shrugged.

*

“Fine. I tell you what I am and how I came to be this way, if you let me out.” Elijah said. When the man in red paused, clearly looking for loopholes, Elijah raised his eyebrows. “If you satisfy my curiosity on a few points, I might tell you more than that.” When he had been human, the only people who could afford to wear that shade of red had been extremely important. This would be a man used to getting his own way and used to having to fight for it. When the glare wasn’t in his eyes, Elijah could see that his would-be jailor was slightly shorter than he was and broader in the chest and shoulders. It had been decades but Elijah still recognized a swordsman when he saw one. There was an odd feeling of homecoming in that.

“How do I know you’ll keep your word?” he asked, touching his mouth gently.

“You have my word. I don’t have any assurances stronger than that.” Elijah said.

After a moment of silence, the swordsman used his toe to scrape the blood sigil. “I am Lord Rahl.”

“Elijah Mikaelson,” Elijah said, stepping outside of the sigil. He eyed the women in leather as he took another deep breath of the sweet air. Looking out an arrow slit, the horizon was so clean it practically sparkled. “You conducted a major magical working during the day?”

“On the point of noon.” Rahl said. “Every noon for the last three moon cycles.”

Elijah looked down at the floor. That did explain how old the blood smelled. He waited to see if the lord would push him to fulfill his promise. Only the slight twitching of his fingertips gave away Rahl’s impatience. When he was satisfied that Rahl was waiting on him, Elijah spoke. “I am a vampire and my mother made me this way.”

Rahl’s breathing hitched with impatience. “And what is a vampire?”

Elijah stepped closer to Rahl, pushing the Lord to react. When Rahl stood his ground, Elijah allowed his eyes to blacken and his fangs to protrude. The women in red tensed at the corners of Elijah’s vision. Their heartbeats remained admirably steady and the leader took a step toward him. He dashed to stare into her eyes instead. “Put down your weapon,” he said softly.

“Over my dead body.” She adjusted her grip on what appeared to be a red leather covered rod.

“Put your weapon down,” he repeated, holding her eyes with his own and pushing her to obey. His miscalculation was in thinking that the weapon was like a baton, its danger in increasing the force the wielder could bring to bear without breaking the bones in her hand. The pain was overwhelming, driving all thought from him. Out of pure instinct he retreated across the room in an eye-blink before clearing his throat. “Do that again and I will rip your heart from your chest.”

*

Darken called off the Mord’Sith with a sharp gesture. He could feel their rage boiling like a pressure filling the room and he keenly missed the power to reach out and harness that anger. Without the Rahl Bond, he had no direct control, no connection. He hadn’t noticed it at first. Garen had been as devoted as ever and he had been distractingly glad to not be in the Underworld anymore. Gradually, he had felt it like a phantom limb. There was a place in him where his Gift belonged, his tether to D’Hara. 

“What was that supposed to accomplish?” Darken asked, tense and ready to spring away from Elijah even though his rational mind could see that this vampire creature was too fast to escape.

“I proved a point,” Elijah said smoothly, blinking twice in rapid succession.

“How did your mother do it?” Darken asked, curiosity winning over irritation. To become so long lived and able to move so fast would be worth a great deal to him or anyone. Anything would be better than returning to the Keeper’s grip now that he had betrayed Him.

“Open your mind to me and I’ll show you,” Elijah said, spreading his arms and relaxing his face.

“Open my mind? To you?”

“It would be fastest.” Elijah said, his eyes holding equal parts mockery and challenge. 

Darken was reminded of another pair of eyes that had looked at him the same way before the Seeker had returned. But Cara had been on her knees and daring him to explain his reasoning while Darken had deigned to respond. His first instinct was to show Elijah that he wouldn’t be pushed but the vampire had not underestimated how badly Darken wanted what he had. The flicker of satisfaction in Elijah’s smile told him he’d allowed that thought to cross too close to the surface. The only solution left was not to cringe and to remember this indignity when he had the chance to correct it. 

Elijah didn’t wait for him to verbalize his surrender, a kindness Darken would also remember. He watched the other man cross the room at regular speed, wondering if Elijah could think as fast as he moved. “Relax,” Elijah said, placing his fingers gently on Darken’s face. An electric tingle raced down Darken’s spine. 

As Elijah began to speak, the words faded into the background. Images, sounds, feelings, foreign to Darken poured through his mind in a whirl. The room was distant as he saw a golden-haired woman and knew her to be a mother and a witch. She loved her children as fiercely as any gar protecting her cubs. Elijah was one of those children, loved and protected. Others flickered on the edges like the shadows left behind the eyes after a bright light. A brother, grim and dutiful. A younger brother full of mischief and bloodlust. More solid than they were a younger brother and sister as golden-haired as their mother and just as lovely and dangerous as she.

He felt the hilt of a sword between Elijah’s hands and knew the thrill of battle in his marrow. He saw the hearthfire lighting beloved faces and knew a sense of home and belonging that he had never felt in his life. There was a father and Darken wanted to look away because in his own blood beat the knowledge of the way that part of the story had to end. Darken’s attention was pulled in much the same way he noticed small rodents when he flew as a raptor. He saw one of those beloved children, his memory so worn that there was nothing to it but grief and nostalgia, struck down by a wolf that was a man. He saw the wild grief of the whole family. The conviction of the father to preserve his remaining children. The inescapable magic their mother used to bar death from her children. If Darken’s sorcerers worked nonstop for the rest of his lifetime they might not be able to duplicate the spell because-

Elijah was still saying words but Darken jerked his focus away from the plot Elijah was trying to follow. If he hadn’t been trained with an Agiel, Darken doubted it would have worked. His lips and tongue were thick and distant. “Show me,” he demanded. He felt resistance and dug in, pulling against the power of the other man’s mind until the images and thoughts snapped to a different part of the pattern.

He saw a woman with dark hair and dark eyes and an olive complexion. She had a child by another man but neither Elijah nor his golden brother had cared. They had sought to woo her. There had been strife in the happy home. The mother had put a stop to it by feeding the family the woman’s blood. In a lurch of pain and nausea, the images jolted to another woman. This one identical to the previous in appearance but dressed like a lady where the previous had been a peasant. The shadow of Elijah’s brother-rival fell over this part of the story too. Another young woman with the same face appeared in strange garb made of the same type of weaving as the clothing Elijah wore. The images came awash in regret and attachment.

Taking a deep breath, Darken relaxed his mind and let Elijah’s words carry him back to the wolves.

*

Elijah felt Rahl’s mind as he slowly dropped information into it. His first impression was of green fire and endless moaning and wailing. In the cold and the dark, countless naked people cried for mercy that would never come. The sensation of despair and terror was powerful enough that it took Elijah a moment to recognize it as a memory rather than a desire. Concerned, Elijah didn’t pause in his story as he probed past that powerful memory into the array of thoughts he stirred.

There was a hunger as deep and consuming as any vampire’s thirst for blood. Confused, half-formed images of a dark-haired woman with brown eyes and cheekbones like Rahl’s faded as soon as Elijah tried to get a better look. As Elijah told Rahl of Mikael’s determination, he saw a glimpse of a man in Darken’s mind, heard him say that he would have another son who would destroy Rahl, saw the man lying in a pool of his own blood and a red knife in Darken’s hand.

Elijah’s attitude toward family had not been unusual in his time. The closeness of family had been at the core of most of the mythology and fairy tales Elijah had grown up with. No one had the power to save like family. No one had the power to damn like family. There were reasons the stories of Loki Laufeyson remained popular. Klaus would walk away here and now. He’d go build his own empire of fear or start killing witches until someone gave him a way back to where he’d come from. Elijah led Rahl on a tour of Petrova women.

Tatia’s sacrifice brought out images of bodies on altars, red streaming down. There was a sense of joy in the kill but also purpose. Slaughter with a reason was something Elijah was familiar with. After his mother’s condemnation of their family as a whole, Elijah had been forced to reconsider- He dragged his thoughts back to the story as he realized he had just relayed that condemnation to Rahl. Guiding the story back, he showed Rahl Klaus’s first transformation and Mikael’s reaction.

The images that flowed back along the connection were again of the man who could only be Rahl’s father swiftly followed by a younger man with soft brown eyes. Elijah got to the part where Klaus told Rebekah and him that Mikael had killed their mother and they had responded by swearing allegiance. A small, bitter laugh choked its way out of Rahl as Elijah caught a fleeting glimpse of a redheaded, blue-eyed woman with a massive bruise on her face. Rahl was not surprised at all to find out Klaus had killed her himself and still less surprised that Klaus killed Mikael.

“Are you sure you want this?” Elijah asked, knowing the answer.

“We don’t have the woman. My sorcerers can’t duplicate the spell without that.” Rahl said thoughtfully, pulling away from Elijah’s hands. 

“There’s a way around that.” Elijah said, watching the human man’s pulse point move harder. “You would never be as fast or as strong as I am but you would be faster and stronger than you are now. You would stop aging and become invulnerable to most weaponry.”

“What’s the cost?” Rahl asked with a touch of weariness that awakened a feeling in Elijah’s chest. A feeling he tried to immediately dampen.

“I have told you a great deal about my family. Tell me about this world and what I can expect from it. How would I get home?” Elijah said, dodging the other aspect of that question. “Is magic commonplace here?”

Rahl was silent.

“Your guards wield magical weapons. Do they have-”

“My guards are well trained.” Rahl interrupted. “Our myths say that the Creator Gifted most people with the ability to be touched by magic but not to wield it. A few are Gifted with the ability to change the world through force of will and an even rarer few are immune to magic but not its consequences.”

“So there are witches.”

“Witches, wizards, sorcerers, conjurers, sorceresses,” Rahl shrugged. “Take your pick.”

“Where can I find the nearest witch?” Elijah asked.

“Agaden Reach. Good luck getting anything out of her.” Rahl snorted.

“She doesn’t like you.” Elijah said, feeling himself smile. “Take me to her and I’ll tell you how you can become like me.”

Rahl’s blue eyes narrowed as he agreed.


End file.
